On the other hand, Perl makes an excellent first language for people who aren't going to be career programmers: it's easy to get a lot done with only a little knowledge, which means less lag time between starting to program and solving your problems.

Like BorgCopyeditor, I realize this statement describes my relationship with Perl clearly and succinctly. I am not a career programmer. Rather, I stay on the fringes of programming: Oracle DBA training and consulting. Up until the past few months, I've basically read about Perl, written a few little utilities to help with my work and browsed Perl related websites.

Although I can read code in many languages, and have been through the first few chapters of some of the Learn <language> in 24 hours, Perl is the first language in which I've written a useful application for my clients.

I find Perl to be challenging and useful. I seriously doubt it will ever cease to challenge me. I know it will never cease to be useful for me.

Perl as a very first programming language? With my exposure to other languages, I didn't consider myself completely green, although through exploring Perl, I've learned more about other languages. Should I start my children off with Perl? I think I just might... In a few years, they'll be teaching me!

-Daruma